


All the Comforts of Home

by by_no_one_more_than_me (Lady_Cleo)



Series: All the Comforts of Home [1]
Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: F/M, Fangirls, I would snuggle Michael Sheen daily if I could, I'm Not Ashamed, I'm making that a tag, Murder Daddy - Freeform, My First Work in This Fandom, Puns & Word Play, Short One Shot, do not copy to another site
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-28
Updated: 2019-09-28
Packaged: 2020-10-29 19:37:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20801855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lady_Cleo/pseuds/by_no_one_more_than_me
Summary: Malcolm stops by to talk to his dad and discovers an interesting new amenity in the cell.





	All the Comforts of Home

**Author's Note:**

> Prodigal Son is my latest crack. There may be more fic. We'll just have to see....

Malcolm sighs, fingertips tapping an erratic beat on his denim-clad knee as he steels himself to action. Either get up and go inside, or start the car and drive home to another sleepless night shackled to his bed.

He hates that he comes here, hates that he feels he has to sometimes. He should be smarter, knows he is, knows he's hiding. There's a choice to make every time: go it alone and take the risk he won't solve it in time, or trade his father another sliver of his soul for his assistance.

Most of the time it seems worth it, but one of these days he's going to make the wrong choice - if he hasn't already. A frustrated hand plows through his hair and grips tight, teeth filtering a hiss of pain that forces him to focus. Maybe he damned himself the day he first stepped back across the threshold of his father's cell, only slightly surprised at the amenities, the freedoms, the privileges he's been allowed. A modern-day Hannibal Lecter, able to manipulate everything and everyone around him to get what he wants.

Bright wouldn't even be here now if it hadn't been a week. A week of no answers, of one body after another, the marks of his failure piling up like twigs for a funeral pyre. This latest case has been battering him like an angry mob, the details slithering through the holes in his imagination like worms on a corpse. There's something he's missing. He can see the outline, the faintest blur of a shape, but nothing solid. He can't let another victim fall, can't take another loss right now. They have to find this guy. They _have _to.

He has to.

_So one foot in front of the other, kid. Flash the ID to the guard in his concrete and Lexan fortress. Arms out, breath steady as the wand passes. Take the visitor pass and clip it to the collar with a hand that only tremors a little._

_Make a fist. Take a breath. Close your eyes._

The door opens and he steps inside, eyes to the floor, hitting the edge of the Aubusson rug and extending the case folder until it's taken, three steps back to the folding visitor's chair he finds through muscle memory.

His father isn't trying to engage him today. Maybe he knows better. If Malcolm can just make it through, keep the focus on the case and off himself, get this damn thing solved, then maybe he can actually find some sleep tonight.

He doesn't say anything, just counts the woven threads on a 2x2 section of his jeans, does a bit of math to extrapolate how many threads are in the entire garment. He's double-checking the answer on his mental whiteboard when he slowly becomes aware of an anomaly.

There is the sound of papers flicking up and over as Martin reviews the file, the ambient white noise of industrial ventilation, the faint clinking of the shackles and the creak of his chair, the rustle of fabric as one or the other shifts... and breathing. He hears his own muted sniffs, his father's deeper inhalations as he loses himself in his musings... and a third rhythm he hadn't noticed when he came in. Quiet, regular, soft... relaxed.

It can't be the guards outside; the meshed window is too thick to allow that, only sirens and klaxons and pleas for help able to penetrate. This is a new development, a new piece on the board of this warped game they play. And he doesn't know what it means.

Curiosity finally gets the better of him and he raises his eyes to where his father sits, perpendicular to the heavy desk in - a new chair. Sturdy, plushly upholstered, with a broader seat and a wider back that stops just under his shoulders... across which is draped a very unexpected sight.

It's a girl - _a young woman_, he mentally corrects himself. Late 20s maybe, smooth face defying immediate classification into an age bracket. Voluptuous form clad in pajamas, height hard to determine from her coiled feline pose, but he'd guess shorter than either man in the room. She's lying on her side, knees bent so her thighs form a cushion for his father's temple, one hand twining through his curls while the other arm braces on the desktop to hold her own head up, a long braid coiled around her elbow, bare toes curling and flexing in a lazy cadence.

Her sleep pants are fuzzy fleece printed all over with white teacups and the initials M.D., while her top is a snug black tee declaring her "**Property of Martin Whitly, Murder Daddy**" in violent crimson slashes that make his teeth ache.

"Who's that?"

Two pairs of eyes flick up to meet his - stormy slate grey and molten chocolate brown - before turning to regard each other. They're having some silent conversation, eyebrow semaphore and psychic connection, her fingers still in his hair and his head still cradled on her thighs and Malcolm wants to scream at them to stop.

Eventually she sighs, breaking their locked gaze and using impressive abdominal strength to pull herself upright before slipping soundlessly off the back of the chair, straightening from the crouch she'd landed in as she appears to weigh options for relocation. Her eyes stare longingly at the space beside Martin, as though imagining herself wedged in beside him, before snapping to Malcolm's wide stare.

Turning without another word she heads to the bed against the wall, lounging across the neat bedding and tucking the pillow under her chin as she watches them sullenly over the top of a paperback romance novel.

Returning his focus to his father takes considerably more effort than he anticipated, a scalding thread of shame creeping up his spine at the realization she'd only moved so to set him at ease - and a sense of spoiled relief that it had worked.

"That is... Cat." Three little words loaded with so much more unsaid, betrayed by the way his father's eyes keep trailing back to her. "So about this-"

"What's she doing here?"

Martin blinks at the interruption, then recovers to flash that wide grin of his, only twisted slightly out of true by the force of the stretch. "I asked the board if I could have a fan for my cell."

It's such a dad joke, a real groan-worthy pun, yet Malcolm finds himself stifling a laugh - dragging it back and smothering it before it can escape. His father no doubt spots the faint twitch of his lips and knows the reason, just as he knows Martin will say nothing further on the topic. At least, not today.

He should bring her something next time, find out if she likes chocolate or gummy bears, maybe a new book, some fluffy socks.

_First things first though._

"So. Dad. About this case..."

**Author's Note:**

> How this came about: I was on Twitter, I saw a thing, I made a comment, then the comment blossomed into an idea and this was born. Basically zero shame about anything... except maybe the pun at the end.  
Also, I'm pretty sure even in the most unbelievable realm of television, mental institutions for the criminally insane don't allow you people in the cells as rewards for good behavior. Although if they did... and I could sign up for either Hannibal in the BSHCI or this new cuddly doctor... I would. 
> 
> Anyway, comments and kudos always appreciated.


End file.
